Category: Business Building

Posted on

Say No At Least Once a Week

As you work building in daily habits that will make you more successful, one of the skills you need to practice and habituate is saying no more.

For the next month or so, start saying no to something at least once a week.

say no

The way to choose what to say no to is to check your goals, look at your schedule, and ask yourself what you really want. If an action leads you to reach your goals and fits your schedule, saying yes is fine, but if it does not provide any value to you or does not fit into your schedule right now, say no.

 

When you do say no, you don’t owe anyone a reason with few exceptions. However, here are some reasons and ways that you can say no more often.

 

If You Already Know Say So

 

Sometimes you simply know that you don’t want to do something no matter what. Instead of putting people off or saying yes just to avoid the issue, start saying no right away. For example, if you have a friend involved in an MLM and constantly asks you to come to parties or buy things, and you have but resent it, start saying no and ask them to stop asking you.

 

Say I’ll Think About It

 

You don’t have to give people answers right away about anything. This can help you reduce the pressure on yourself to say yes to anything. Start making it a habit always to say, “Let me check my schedule. I’ll get back to you by 3 pm on Friday with my answer.” This way, they can wait patiently, and you can ensure that you want to say yes or no.

 

Always Check Your Schedule

 

Even if your first thought is that it’s something you want to do, you must always check your schedule before saying yes. You may be over booked already, and even if you’re going to say yes, you need to say no. Doing this will ward off burnout. Stretching yourself too thin is bad for you and everyone else that depends on you too.

 

Offer Alternatives

 

Sometimes you can’t do what your customer or the person wants, but you can turn your no into a yes in the recipient’s mind. If you know someone who can do the thing being asked of you better, tell them about it. If you can offer some help but not exactly what was asked for, say exactly that to the person.

 

One thing to remember is that you don’t have to be part of everything in your community. Saying no allows others to step up. Suppose you’re the type that runs your PTA, a small business, and more than two or three community organizations and clubs. You’re probably doing too much. Let others shine and take your time back. Your friends and family and you will thank you.

Write Down 3 Things You’re Grateful for Each Day

 

Posted on

Write Down 3 Things You’re Grateful for Each Day

One of the very first habits it’s important to incorporate into your daily life if you want to be happy and feel successful is the habit of gratitude. Being grateful is more than looking on the bright side. It’s actually about being realistic about what is good in your life.

I am Grateful

To record your gratitude, use whatever method works best for you, whether it’s to email yourself, using a paper diary, or some other method. The important thing is that you acknowledge in a way that can be tracked at least three things you’re grateful for so that you can look back on it and measure how far you’ve come.

Tips to Help You Practice Positive Thinking

Plus, there are many benefits to appreciation outside of a good mindset.

 

  • You’ll Feel Happier – The saying about what you focus on grows is very true, especially when your focus is on something positive about your life. When you can see the good in your life as it’s happening, you’ll be much more likely to be able to do it again.

 

  • You’ll Be More Satisfied with Your Life – It’s so easy to focus on things when they go wrong. You missed your alarm clock, you got caught in the rain, you spilled food on your new shirt – all seem like bad things until you realize oversleeping enabled you to cuddle with your spouse longer, the rain cooled you down after lunch, and you only spilled the food because you were laughing with your best friend.

 

  • You’ll Become Less Materialistic – When you focus on the positive, it becomes clear that it’s not things that make you happy or successful – it’s experiences. As you realize that your life becomes so much richer and then, of course, you feel more comfortable and experience your life as successful.

 

  • You’ll Be Less Likely to Suffer from Burnout – If you’re aware of yourself and stay mindful, you can avoid experiencing burnout in the first place. Taking the time to record your gratitude lets you concentrate on the good parts, which can calm you down and let you place your focus where it belongs.

 

  • You’ll Experience Better Physical Health – People who can turn their focus to what’s good in their life are more likely to exercise, eat right, and stay mindful about their health.

 

  • You’ll Sleep Better Every Night – Getting everything out on paper before bed is a great time to focus on gratitude. You’ll fall asleep faster as your good mood will result in reduced anxiety.

 

  • You’ll Feel Less Fatigue – When you sleep better at night due to less anxiety, you’re naturally going to feel more well-rested and sharp during the day.

 

  • You’ll Feel Healthier Due to Suffering from Less Inflammation – Sleeping better and being less anxious has great effects in a positive direction on body-wide information thought to be one of the driving factors in disease.

 

  • You’ll Be More Mentally Resilient – Not having your mind clouded with all the negativity of the day is going to help you bounce back when things do go wrong. When you can turn your brain toward what’s good about something, you can usually get back on the path faster.

 

  • You’ll Be More Patient – Not being on edge due to anxiety and bad thoughts will also increase your patients with others and yourself too. After all, there is often something good you can take from almost everything, eventually.

 

  • You’ll Have Better and More Solid Relationships – People like being around those who are more positive than they do people who are always on edge and anxious. If you really want to build strong relationships, focus on the positive more.

 

As you can see, being grateful carries many benefits that will make your entire life better. No one is asking you to be thankful for a bad situation, especially something beyond your control, but you need to look at what is working in your life, analyze why that is working, and then do more of that. The best way to do that is to look for things to be grateful for each and every day.

 

 

Posted on

Your Lack of Focus Is Getting in Your Way

Are you constantly struggling to get your work done? You start one project only to find yourself tapping away at another, then the next two minutes, you find yourself doing it again but on something completely different. Even with a to-do list, you can’t seem to get on track and find the focus to finish your tasks. It’s easy to do, but you must change your bad habit before it gets in your way.

 

Your lack of focus is affecting your business success in the following common ways:

 

Leads to Poor Productivity and Quality of Work

When you don’t have the right focus and concentration on your work, it leads to mistakes and poor decisions as you don’t have the clarity you need to work at your best.

 

Leads to Inconsistent Habits and Results

You need innovation and creativity to stay relevant and competitive—all of which could be stalled or lackluster without proper focus.

 

Uses Valuable Resources Incorrectly

Ultimately it depletes valuable time and financial resources that could better be used somewhere else. When you don’t do your best the first time, you’ll leave behind mistakes.

 

If you have trouble with focus, here are five things you can give a try right now:

 

#1: Reoutline Your Intentions

One cause of lack of focus is that they forgot what they were going after. Even worse, they chose goals that were unrealistic and didn’t relate to who they really are. It’s easy to lose track if you really don’t want it.

 

#2: Craft A Vision Board

Create a board of pictures, drawings, or objects that inspire your ideal life and dreams. In five years, what are your expectations about your life and your business? Even better, what are you working on in your business right now that will make the most impact on your success as you envision it? Add that to your vision board and put it somewhere you will see every day to encourage you to get right back on track. Often a lack of focus is due to an unclear vision of the future.

 

#3: Play Brain Games

Make it fun and play memory and concentration-building games from Lumosity. Lumosity provides many fun games that include a specific section to improve your focus. The idea is to exercise your brain just like you would do other parts of your body at the gym.

 

#4: Change Your Environment

Create an environment that influences movement and positivity. As you work on different projects or goals, change the setting to fit.

 

#5: Go to Bed

Are you constantly yawning or getting blurry vision? Then you need to get some sleep. If you don’t have the right amount of sleep, you won’t be capable of concentrating.

 

As you can see, focus plays a crucial role in the actions you take for your business and life. Without it, you easily leave behind a messy and disorganized company.

 

Stay More Focused with These Five Simple Steps

 

Posted on

Are You Really Being Accountable?

If you want to achieve your business goals or live a happier life, you must learn how to be more accountable. Accountability means that you take ownership and responsibility for yourself—no matter what challenges and things get in your way.

Are You Really Being Accountable?

It’s excluding excuses from your way of life and harnessing values that increase your productivity. When you better understand how your actions or lack of activities affect everyone around you, you can better control what needs to be done or improved to accomplish your goals.

 

The following are a few ways that can help you become more accountable to achieve more quarterly and daily goals:

 

Honesty Is the Best Policy

Be honest with the mistakes you have made or situations you experience. If you find yourself making excuses or blaming others, then it’s likely you are not accountable for your actions and responses.

 

Understand Expectations Clearly

Take responsibility and learn your expectations inside and out. Don’t wait for others to provide the information for you or use the excuse you didn’t know. Ask as many questions as possible so that you can find resources that build you up.

 

Celebrate Wins and Quickly Forgive Faults

While it is crucial to track your strengths and weaknesses to be more accountable, you should also forgive yourself and quickly move on. You don’t want the process to be about self-doubt and abuse.

 

You want to recognize it for what it is, then figure out what you need to improve and forgive yourself. Owning your mistakes does not mean you should dwell on them. In fact, that only keeps you behind longer. It is okay to make mistakes. You are only human, but not owning up to them or evaluating where you need to improve only harms you in the long run.

 

Value Your Time

When you don’t take accountability, you are using up time no matter if it’s obvious or not. While it can be hard to own up to mistakes, it is even worse to repeat them repeatedly until it’s too late.

 

Have Weekly Check-Ins

Have weekly check-ins with an accountability partner, mentor, or perform self-assessments. Partners and self-assessment tests are valuable as they can ensure and guide you on the right path. They can give you the tough love and recognition you need to take responsibility for yourself and do the work required.

 

As you can see, accountability is a crucial skill needed to increase your productivity and success of your business. It’s about being honest with yourself and what you want from life and evaluating your actions and processes to get there.  If you don’t take accountability, you can be sure you won’t realize your fullest potential.

 

 

 

Posted on

Harness the Power of Consistency

Consistency is a skill that is about doing the same habits and routines regularly or repeatedly. It’s about committing to move forward and act no matter what obstacle lies in your way.

 

In other words, consistency is the repetition of the movements that get you closer to your goals. With consistency, you improve your weaknesses, perfect your strengths, empower yourself to accomplish more, and increase your productivity.

If You Don’t Set Hard Deadlines, Plan to Fail

To fully harness the power of consistency, you need to be more accountable, focused, and mindful of your actions. If you don’t, your business will suffer in many different ways.

 

Here are a few ways your lack of consistency is affecting your business and how to improve it:

 

Delays Action and Wastes Valuable Time

Without consistency, you only waste your time and other valuable resources. Your performance suffers, and so does your work.

 

Stalls Momentum

Routines build up the momentum you need to keep going with ease and comfort each day. When you don’t stay consistent, it’s much harder to get your days going as you plan your day unorganized. Consistency gives you a clearer understanding of what you want to do so you can keep going easily.

 

Stalls Personal Growth and Improvement

Consistency allows you to practice, which in turn improves your skills and makes you better. When you don’t take the time to improve or take care of yourself, your business will suffer too as you continue to make poor decisions.

 

Creates Unhealthy Expectations

No success happens overnight. If you don’t think you need consistency to be successful, then you are likely on the wrong path. It takes repeated actions each day over a set amount of time to get there.

 

Unlock Your Resistance

If you want to harness the power of consistency, you must figure out what holds you back. Lack of desire or clearly understanding the direction you want to go in life will create resistance to action. For many, it’s due to fear of success or wanting instant gratification and having an “all or nothing mindset.” Whatever it may be, you need to look deep within yourself and be honest to find the cure and get back on track.

 

Chance Your Perspective and Attitude

Some days, you will not feel the best, and some days, others will get in your way. However, it does not matter what life throws at you. There is always a way to see it more positively and objectively to push forward and get what you want. You only have now, so don’t waste it any longer.

 

Start Small

Find one task or activity that you know you can do every day without a second thought. Then add another step until that action becomes second nature. Test and repeat until you have a full and consistent workflow that works for your needs.

 

Remember, the more consistent you are, the happier you and your customers will be. Over time, the work will become easier, saving you time and energy to create more and be the next leading innovator within your industry.

 

 

Posted on

Stay More Focused with These Five Simple Steps

Focus shows you have the drive and desire to want to achieve something. It’s about putting all your energy into one thing and getting it down with grit and determination. It ingrains your goals and keeps you on the path of success. However, it’s hard to maintain and easily affects your business if you don’t.

 

Here are five steps to improve your focus and prevent self-sabotage from destroying your success:

 

Step 1: Find Your Mantra

Everyone has something unique to them that drives them to keep going—for example, putting on music while you work or giving yourself words of encouragement. Whatever it may be, find what resonates with you and repeat it every day before you get to work. If you are not sure, try giving yourself a pep talk in the mirror first thing in the morning and see just how much more productive and positive your day becomes.

 

Step 2: Commit to Healthy Routines

Adopting a healthy lifestyle and exercise routine is one of the best ways to ensure you get the right nutrients your body needs to function optimally. Poor concentration and memory problems are direct messages from your body that it is missing essential nutrients to work correctly. Learn to listen to it and always strive to provide it what it needs.

 Avoid Burnout: How to Exercise and Sleep More

Step 3: Eliminate Distractions

Put your distractions like cell phones in a different room or turn on your StayFocused chrome browser extension to block YouTube or other sites you always lose track of time on. Create the right working environment that inspires you to work at your best and quickly. Throw out clutter and things that don’t provide value to your work.

 

Step 4: Commit to Mindfulness

To be more focused, you have to commit to do so and be mindful of your actions and surroundings. You can’t expect others to provide that information for you, nor will their perspective be automatically valuable. As only you know what you need and want from life, no one else. Only you know if music distracts you or if your set goals don’t actually align, for example.

 

Step 5: Plan More Effectively

Find the right time of day to do your work. All humans have a set number of productive hours and times of day that work best for them. Test and experiment with various schedules to see what works best for you. Just because everyone else works a 9 to 5 schedule doesn’t mean you have to, too.

 

Don’t let your lack of focus get in your way any longer. Determine what you really want in life, create an action plan, take responsibility, and control your own life.

Stay More Focused with These Five Simple Steps

Posted on

Always Plan First and Last

The thing that marks a good business is planning. A business plan for where they hope to bring their business and daily plans to guide their actions to achieve it.

 

You’ve likely heard the famous quote “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail” many times before, and that is because it is so powerful and accurate. There is no other way to put it. Just because you don’t plan doesn’t mean you don’t know the direction it will go. As statistics prove over again, you are more likely to go down than up.

Business Plan Resources You Can Use

Here are a few tips and tricks to apply for better planning your day and business:

 

Plan First and Last

An often-used productivity hack by many businesses and entrepreneurs includes creating a to-do list at the beginning and end of their workday. This strategy improves your business overall by increasing your time management skills, consistency, and accountability.

 

When you start and end with a to-do list, you allow flexibility and ensure you are always working on your top priorities and staying on topic—enabling you to cut out unnecessary or mundane tasks that only keep you away from your main objective.

 

Not only that, but it can also be a great reminder and motivational factor. Lists enable you to be ready to go and can give you the push to get started sooner.

 

Make It Simple and Fun

Planning doesn’t have to be complicated, and business isn’t always dull. Use colorful pens or fun phone applications to write down your goals. Add fun and small rewards when you accomplish each step. Remember to keep it simple, and to the point, so it doesn’t overwhelm you.

 

Think Small, Medium, and Large

Think about three objectives you want to accomplish for that day but organize them into three separate categories:

 

  • One Large – The task you want to do right away as it’s the hardest to do and makes the most significant impact on your main objective for that month.
  • One Medium – This is the bulk of your day that isn’t too hard to do but likely to use more of your time—for example, a group meeting or coffee with a client.
  • One Small – This is the task you can focus on at the end of your day and relax. Ideally, you want this task to be easy and pretty mindless.

 

This method aims to give you a starting point and organize your day where you are not running out of energy and momentum.

 

Don’t let your days get away from you anymore with these planning tips. Remember, a business without a plan is one that will likely fail. Don’t let that be you when you have the power and control to make it happen with the right strategy and commitment to daily action.

 

How to Be Realistic About Time

Posted on

Invest in More Training and Education

When you invest in more training and education, you are investing in yourself and ensuring a successful life for you and your business. Through education, creativity and innovation are born. What you achieve and don’t do in life is a symptom of the knowledge and experiences you have gained.

 

As they commonly say, “You can’t know what you don’t know.” Simple to put, yet complex in nature when you really break it down. In other words, when you lack the knowledge, you can’t make the right decisions. This is why it’s essential to take the time to find and invest in the right education to be sure you do what needs to be done to live your idea of success.

 

The following are four important reasons you should never skip on an opportunity to learn and gain more knowledge:

The Importance of Continued Learning in Life and Business

To Increase Your Reputation and Trustworthiness

To make a sale in a business, you need to form trust with your target audience. This requires your ability to build a favorable reputation for your brand. The more you educate yourself within your industry, the better you can understand how to do this.

 

To Bring About New Opportunities and Experiences

Personal growth, innovation, and creativity are developed through the experiences and opportunities you take. You get a chance to see life from many different perspectives as you meet and interact with more people. Giving you more opportunities to network and to better optimize your business.

 Be More Proactive and Less Reactive to Achieve Higher Success

To Have A Competitive Advantage

The one consistency to life is change. While scary to most, it is actually a beautiful thing. Change has afforded you all the wonderful experiences, people, and possessions you get to enjoy today. Change in business can happen fast, and before you know it, you are no longer relevant. Education can keep you relevant and ahead of your competition as you are proactive to keep up and become more creative.

 

To Improve Strengths and Weaknesses

Finally, but certainly not least, education provides you the ability to improve your weakness and perfect your strengths. Even more so, it can unlock abilities and skills you never know you had. Further increasing your creativity and giving your business a unique and personal advantage.

 

To Improve Empathy and Compassion

Education provides you information and different perspectives about the world. Empathy and compassion help you develop a deep understanding of the world, its challenges, and how people interact. With empathy and compassion, you can create better products, ideas and get through obstacles more efficiently and successfully.

 

Investing in education will always be a gain, even if you can’t see it directly. It can improve the quality of work, increase your revenue, improve your communication and understanding of the world to better plan and be more effective with your time. Increasing your success and happiness in the long run, making it one of, if not, the best investment you can make in business.

Posted on

Essential Elements of The Realistic Optimist

If you want to be more productive, striving to be more of a realistic optimist might be the strategy for you. If you ask a successful entrepreneur what values or attitudes you should project, realism and optimism will likely be high on their list. An optimistic mindset should always be filtered with realism to see success. You can be a positive person all day long, but that doesn’t mean you will get what you want if you don’t act.

 

Here are a few tips to help you become a realistic optimist:

 

Unrealistic Vs. Realistic Optimist: Understand the Difference

One of the best methods to learning how to do something is to discover what not to do first. Being positive is great and has many benefits but doesn’t do anyone favors if it’s unrealistic. Toxic positivity only keeps you back and focused on the wrong things.

 

The distinction between a realistic optimist and an unrealistic one is their actions and their perspective on the world. Unrealistic optimists believe they will have success no matter what, even if they don’t work on it. They deserve and are owed success and the path to it won’t be complicated or challenging.

 

Realistic optimists are the exact opposite. While they too believe their life will be successful, they understand it is still up to them to realize that they have to seek knowledge and education, recognize mistakes, improve skills, and go after their dreams. They don’t wait around for it to come. They are proactive and always take on new challenges because they see them grow and gain more.

Changing Your Mindset: Attitude is Everything

Keep It Positive but Relevant and Attainable

An optimist is someone who is hopeful and confident about their life and the direction it will go. They believe that the world is ultimately good, and that evil will never prevail. While it sounds great, it’s not very practical on its own.

 

The world may be ultimately good, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be hard or challenging, which is why you need realism to balance it out. Realism makes sure that the plan you are taking is relevant to your ultimate dreams and ultimately attainable.

 

Only Focus on What You Can Control

One of the main objectives of a realistic optimist is to only focus on and control what you can. There is no point in ruminating or overthinking something that you have no ability to change.

 

You can’t change the weather; you can’t control people’s emotions, but you can control how you respond and which actions you take or don’t to get around it. You know the weather can change at a moment’s notice, so always have a plan B, for example.

 

Use these tips to be more positive and realistic to achieve maximum productivity, happiness and never miss any opportunity.

 

Changing Your Mindset: Attitude is Everything

Posted on

Your Lack of Realism Is Stalling Your Success

Realism allows you to manage your time better to plan more efficiently with improved confidence, clarity, and focus on tackling your goals. Realism ensures positivity and actions that result in creating attainable and relevant pursuits. Realistic people are said to be more independent and practical with their time.

Managing Your Mental State (When Times Are Tough) or (Through Adversity)

They use education, knowledge, and mindfulness to their advantage to make the right decisions. You will rarely see them go with the flow or not take a moment to recognize it for what it truly is. Without realism, you are likely down a rocky path of confusion and low self-confidence as you continue to accomplish goals that don’t lead to happiness or try to go after ones that don’t make sense and are out of reach.

This is a Great Jim Rohn Video that highlights the Steps to setting Realistic Goals. Pure Gold!

 

The following are a few tips to help you be more realistic to improve your business and life:

 

Always Stop to Think and Evaluate

Your parents might have told you this already, but it’s important to reiterate and harder than one might think. However, it’s the first step you should take to being more realistic. If you don’t stop and thoroughly analyze the situation, it could lead to more problems down the road. Miscommunication often stems from reacting right away rather than fully listening and being aware in that moment. It only takes a few minutes to evaluate your situation to be sure the information you are receiving and dissecting is accurate or not.

 

Develop More Awareness

Realism develops through experiences and education. Taking the time to learn about other people and the challenges or different things they go through in life allows you to see a different perspective and really see things for what they are. When you know all sides of the equation, you won’t be shocked at the result.  Join local events, industry conferences and surround yourself with more people that have similar interests and goals.

Ask for Feedback and Advice

Don’t shy away from constructive feedback, advice, or different point of view. The purpose is to provide you more insight and information you can’t see for yourself. Even if their opinions may not be true in the end, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t value you in some way. Now you know what not to do, for example.

 

Take Responsibility

Commit to being more mindful and responsible for your actions and inactions. This means being proactive with your life and gaining the knowledge required to form the success you want. Recognize your mistakes and find ways to improve, and always strive to be and do better.

 

Remember, the key to realism is to slow down, experience more, take in as much information as possible to create the right action steps to achieve your dreams and aspirations.